Total profits for the world aviation industry are expected to hit 31.4 billion USD this year, more than five percent above a forecast of 29.8 billion USD by the International Air Transport Association. The Association has forecast revenue of 743 billion USD if the global economy continues to grow. The industry’s profit in 2016 was 35.6 billion USD matching the previous year.

Airbus forecasts that the global civil aircraft market will double in the next two decades. In its Global Market Forecast (GMF) for 2017-2036, Airbus anticipates that air traffic will grow at 4.4 per cent annually, requiring 35,000 new passenger and dedicated freight aircraft worth 5.3 trillion USD over the next 20 years.  This means that the industry will create hundreds of thousands of new jobs including 530,000 new pilots and 550,000 engineers and flight attendants. But that growth will vary between regions. North America and Asia Pacific are forecast to have the highest growth this year thanks to airline merger and an increasing number of cheap airlines. China is likely to become the world’s largest aviation market. In the next two decades, emerging markets including China, India and certain Asian and Latin American countries will buy half of the world’s aircrafts.

Modern technology has contributed to increasing the performance of the global aviation industry. The number of airline passengers is expected to reach 4 billion this year. The growing aviation industry will boost tourism, trade, and investment globally.